


So Far From Me

by siriuslyhiddenlawyer



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Captain Sherlock Holmes, Doctor Molly Hooper, F/M, Sherlock is in the military, Sherlolly - Freeform, Sherlolly Kisses, Sherlolly WWI, Sherlolly au, Sherlolly meets Parades End, WWI AU, sherlolly angst, sherlolly fluff, sherlolly love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-05
Updated: 2018-11-02
Packaged: 2019-06-22 00:55:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 18,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15570177
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/siriuslyhiddenlawyer/pseuds/siriuslyhiddenlawyer
Summary: Molly and Sherlock have fought every battle together, how can they go through WWI without each other?





	1. Chapter 1

            She couldn’t not follow him.

            She couldn’t leave him be.

            She couldn’t let herself exist in a world where he was lying dead in a ditch somewhere and her heart continued to beat.

            She prayed, she hoped that if his heart stopped, hers would too.

            What was her existence without him?

            What was it worth, without him in her life? In the world?

            His heartbeat sustained her more than her own heart did, the very air in his lungs kept her moving.

            How could she leave him? How could she not follow him?

            He’d been gone for six months and for those six months, she closed her eyes and all she saw was him in his uniform, his captain’s bars gleaming under the sun as he towered over her, his eyes a swirl of green and blue that held her universe.

            Her mate, her love, her Sherlock.

            She could still close her eyes and feeling the gentle way he cupped her face in his huge hands, those long fingers, the way he could quite resist the temptation of pressing his thumb against her bottom lip, the smile that curled the corner of his mouth when she sighed helplessly for him.

            _My Sherlock_.

            After years of being associates, of being Sherlock Holmes’ favorite medical consultant, after years of friendship where they had circled each other, loving from afar, moving closer and closer to each other until there was nothing between them except air. She’d gasped at the honesty on his face, the truth in his eyes as he’d looked down at her in the moonlight so many lifetime’s ago, his voice darker than the darkest, moonless nights, “Molly Hooper,” he’d murmured, his eyes studying her face as if memorizing every detail, committing to memory every twitch of muscle or hitched breaths as she gripped the front of his overcoat in her fists, looking up at him with wonder at the sincerity, at the endless, unfathomable love she saw, “if there was ever utility to love—” he’d smiled a sad smile, “there is nothing productive in what I feel for you, and yet I can’t stop thinking about you. And I can’t imagine stopping, or even wanting to stop.”

            Then he’d kissed her, stealing her breath into his lungs, and she’d sighed, melting into him, into his warmth, into her heart. He’d tasted her and she’d let him, groaning into his mouth as she’d opened her mouth for him, finally letting go of his coat and wrapped her arms around his neck, gasping as she pressed her chest to his and moaned. There had been a part of her that had stood apart from them, unbelieving that the ice-cold Sherlock Holmes was capable of this, that the man who had dismissed emotions and love trivial was here, whispering against her mouth that he loved her, that he wanted her, that he was dying for _her._

            Her thoughts swirled and came to the day when he’d come to her in the hospital, his eyes grave, telling her he was joining the war effort, that he was going to be shipped out in a few weeks. She’d tried not to cry, tried not to show him how terrified she was and spent the next two days and nights at Baker Street, in his bed, in his arms. She carried his sighs in her skin, carried his orgasms in her bones. As long as she’d lived, the sight of Sherlock Holmes on the brink of orgasm would forever taunt her, would forever live in the forefront of her mind…the way his ears burned a deep crimson color, the frown that creased his brows as he concentrated, chasing the pleasure he found in her body until he finally found it. Sometimes he’d yell his orgasm, sometimes it would be a voiceless gasp, a silent scream as he held himself inside her.

            He’d left her with a tender kiss, with a promise that he’d come back.

            But Molly Anne Hooper was no ordinary woman, told to wait at home while her man went out and risked his life.

            She was one of the first female doctors, the first female surgeon when the entire world had been telling her that she could be neither. She had graduated from medical school at top of her class when everyone had told her the most she could do with her life was to marry well and have children…male children, for the greatest success. But she had become a formidable doctor, going beyond women’s issues and had become a thoracic surgeon, making waves in research and treatment.

            So she’d marched to Mycroft Holmes’ office, forcing her normally timid voice absolute and sure as she’d demanded to see him, demanded that he forsake whatever kept him busy and see him. Face to face with Sherlock’s brother, she’d looked Mycroft in the eye and asked him to help her join the military, the Army, station her wherever Sherlock was because she needed to be there for him, needed to be a part of the fight.

            “Mr. Holmes,” she’d said in a surprisingly steady voice, “Sherlock and I’ve fought every battle together, I most certainly can’t let him go through the war without me by his side.”

            “Even if I were to help you enter the medical branches as a surgeon,” Mycroft leaned forward, “there is no way I can help you be side by side with him.”

            “Then just get me anywhere near him,” she’d murmured.

            “I don’t even know where he is,” Mycroft had sighed, “he’s deep under cover under the burgeoning special branch of the military Dr. Hooper.”

            “Get me to France.”

            And Mycroft had relented, and she’d been in France in a fortnight.

            She was a woman in a man’s world, a woman caught in the war…a woman whose heart sank into her shoes with every wounded soldier that came and said thousands of prayers that it wasn’t her Sherlock.

            Her birthday came and went and she spent it covered in blood, praying for death. She didn’t want a birthday if he was lying dead somewhere.

            She moved through the hospital, through the wounded, through the blood and gore, the heartbreak and soul aching devastation. The hours she managed to sleep were spent in his arms, and she counted herself lucky if the reality of the war, of the trenches, didn’t invade her dreams of her Sherlock, of his eyes, his lips, his cheekbones…

            One morning she woke up with shouting, her heart heavy, her head aching from a migraine as she forced herself off of her cot. She’d fallen asleep in her surgical gown, still covered in the blood of the wounded, sleepily stumbling towards the oncoming casualties. But there was something wrong in her universe, her body wasn’t functioning, a cement block where her heart should be as she tried to diagnose the mangled bodies that came on the stretcher. She began to curse when the artillery fire drew near, the cement block in her chest growing heavier by the moment as she threw herself over the open surgical wounds of her patients, trying to protect them from the dust that flew with every explosion, with every burst shell.

            She recited every prayer she knew as she worked, praying for her Sherlock, hoping for his heartbeat, for his health…

            _Sherlock_.

            Exhausted, covered in layers of drying blood and mud, after sixteen hours of standing on her feet she collapsed finally on the cot that was designated as hers. She covered her face with her hands, sitting on the edge of the cot as she tried to catch her breath, to clear her head as she forced herself to breath deeply.

            When she opened her eyes, she was convinced she had fallen asleep, that she was dreaming.

            Because there was no way he could be standing there in the doorway, lit by the bare lightbulbs in the old chateaux that was converted into a hospital, wearing his military uniform with a green military overcoat, the collar turned up, his hat drawn down low over his brows. His eyes were on fire as he watched her, blinking rapidly, his face an impenetrable mask, “Molly,” he breathed her name.

            “I’m dreaming,” she murmured as tears flooded her eyes, “this is a dream.”

            He felt so real, so vivid. She could see him with such clarity, she knew exhaustion was working its magic on her because she felt like she could reach out and touch him. Feel the warmth of his skin, the light shadow of inexplicably red beard that shadowed his gorgeous jaw and high cheekbones. But he moved towards her, his back straight as an arrow, his posture perfect as he took the small room in two long strides, whipping off his hat to reveal his familiar, curly black hair, rumpled from sweat and crushed under his hat.

            “No dream,” he told her as he knelt at her feet, “my Molly,” he whispered as he touched her face with his fingertips.

            She swallowed, closing her eyes as she absorbed the sensation of his fingertips against her cheek, “Sherlock?” she breathed, “you’re really here?”

            He smiled gently, “the question is, what are _you_ doing here? I thought Mycroft had had too much chocolate when he told me he’d found you a post with the medical corps.”

            “You,” she swallowed, “my darling, how could I leave you to fight this war alone?”

            He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close to his chest as he kissed her cheek, enfolding her in his familiar warmth, his scent surrounding her as she buried her nose against his throat, “I knew you were near,” he murmured as he hugged her, “I took a deep breath eight months ago, that must have been when you arrived. Molly,” he sighed, “you confound me. You leave me speechless, my darling, leave me gasping for breath and grasping at logic.”

            Molly laughed through her tears, listening to his voice, the familiar rumble, “it’s love Sherlock,” she told him softly, kissing her throat, “you’re my destiny.”

            Sherlock pulled back slightly, pressing his forehead to hers as he smiled, “you’re my mind castle,” he told her, “the air in my lungs, the beat of my heart, the strength in my muscles, the motion in my bones. I love you, Molly Hooper. To the ends of the earth.”

            “I love you,” she murmured, “beyond the end darling, beyond myself.” He pressed his cheek to her breastbone, letting out a sigh, all the tension in his muscles melting from him as she sank her fingers into his hair. “My Sherlock,” she sighed.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enjoy!  
> \-- This hasn't been beta'd or proofread so y'know, forgive me?

            When he pulled away she cupped his face in her palms, stroking his cheeks as she smiled into his eyes, still convinced she was dreaming, that her Sherlock wasn’t here, in her arms, so close to her heart and now within her grasp. “I’ve counted every heartbeat,” she murmured, “every breath without you. A stab of pain, a dull ache right here,” she touched the center of her chest, “a Sherlock sized hole in my heart, my very soul.”

            Sherlock laughed softly, bending down to press lips to the base of her throat, “you never left me,” he told her quietly, “I found you in the darkest nights, the most terrifying of circumstances, helping me solve the most confounding problems, keeping me sane. Aware,” he sighed, his breath warm against her skin, “pushing me to live.”

            Molly turned her face towards him and kissed his forehead as he rested against her chest still, his arms wrapped around her where she sat and he knelt in front of her, between her legs. She vaguely wondered if he cared that she was dirty and in need of a bath, a change of clothes out of the surgical gown that was covered in blood and gore and all kinds of things that she didn’t want to think about. Glancing down at him, she found him so content with his eyes closed, she knew he didn’t care. Just as she didn’t care about his state of untidiness. “You live I live darling, that’s the deal,” she smiled, stroking his hair, twirling his curls between her fingers, “my heart resides in your chest.”

            “You as a surgeon should know that’s anatomically impossible,” his voice was teasing, smiling softly as if in sleep.

            “Philosophically then,” she grinned, tightening her arms around him, “oh my love,” she couldn’t help sighing, “I’ve missed you so much. I still can’t believe you’re here. I’m half convinced I’m going to wake up and realize this was all a dream, that my love isn’t wrapped safely in my arms.”

            He stayed silent for several heartbeats, and they sat, breathing together. She listened to his deep breaths, the familiar whistling in her ear with every inhale, and she suddenly realized she couldn’t hear anything else. The chaos of the wounded, the misery, the death and chaos melted away. The cacophony of the artillery, the psychotic, constant explosion of shells. The shaking calico in the sky, the building crescendo of the roaring train, the immense machinery built to kill such small lives…none of it mattered.

            Sherlock was here. In her arms.

            “Molly,” he sighed at last, “so many years spent with the conviction that I wasn’t a man created for emotion, a man too intelligent for the baseness of it all, for human feelings, and here I am. A man fairly shaking in the trenches not from terror or worry about the war but because you were so far from me, so far from my heart, my body. My skin burns without you now, a constant itching along every surface of my body, dying for you Molly. _Dying_ ,” he pulled away, “for your kisses, for your breath in my lungs,” his eyes burning with a terrible intensity and she felt as if she would burn as she looked up at him, “how can it be?” he growled, “how can your life mean so much to me? It’s _too_ much sometimes, and yet,” he shook his head, “I can’t imagine not feeling this madness.”

            She gasped his name, desperate to kiss him, to taste the words, the confession on his lips as she kissed him, sobbing against his mouth as he swept his tongue over her lips until she opened for him. He tasted her tentatively at first, touching her tongue with his until she had melted against him, pressing him closer, urging him deeper, closer.

            Molly wasn’t surprised when she felt the sting of tears in her eyes, felt the tears running down her cheeks and wondered if they were of relief, of hunger and desperation, of the knowledge that this was temporary, that until the end of the war, these moments were stolen and had to be squirreled away. She gripped the material of his coat in her fists and sobbed into his mouth and he absorbed her with a patience she had never expected from Sherlock Holmes. He hummed for her in the back of his throat, a sound made to be as soothing as the touch of his palms against her hair, stroking the back of her head.

            When he pulled back, both gasping for air, their faces so close she couldn’t move her lips to speak without kissing him, sharing breaths, entangled in each other in so many ways that she wasn’t sure where she ended and Sherlock began, “I love you,” she told him breathlessly, “I love you.”

            “I love you,” he smiled before sweeping her away for another deep kiss, hauling her against his chest and locking his arms behind her as if he never meant to let them go. He kissed her and kissed her, and she smiled against his mouth, thinking how wonderful it would be to spend eternity here, with his tongue stroking hers, with their mouths and breaths infused, with their bodies in an eternal, infinite embrace.

            She was a practical, modern woman, headstrong and stubborn enough to become not only a female, thoracic surgeon but serving as a surgeon in the army as well. But she’d always had half of her head in the clouds too, her soul filled with romance from whatever age she’d begun understanding the concept of romantic love, filling her silent moments with fantasies of love and relationships, of loving with a man in harmony, living as one with a man.

            But she had never loved until Sherlock Holmes, and he had redefined everything she had ever expected of love, of loving and being loved. The intensity of her feelings shocked her, the frantic desperation, the madness, the _hunger_ for everything that he was frightened her. She hated feeling out of control, feeling the dizzying lack of equilibrium that came with knowing that her every mood was controlled by someone else’s existence, that he dictated everything she did, everything she thought about.         

            In all else, she was still the same Molly Hooper she had always known, commanding respect and attention as was underestimated by everyone who crossed her path.

            Yet the Molly Hooper that belonged to Sherlock Holmes, who in turn owned Sherlock Holmes, was a new, frightening reality, a voice in her head that sighed and gasped and moaned his name with every second.

            Running her tongue languidly over his plush bottom lip, she wondered if the madness was normal, if it would pass and settle into something more manageable because this pain was torture, distracting, exquisite hell she never wanted to walk away from.

            She felt him wince as he tried to move his arm behind her to draw her closer to him, the tension returning to his body and flooding her with worry, “darling?” she breathed, her thoughts feeling heavy, words foreign on her swollen lips, “what’s wrong?” she asked, blinking rapidly as sanity returned and she saw his wince.

            “Nothing,” he murmured, brushing his open mouth against hers, “I was simply taught a very important lesson by a German sniper a few hours ago.”

            “What lesson?” Molly yelled.

            “The human body is not meant to be a stopping force against a bullet traveling a certain distance from a sniper’s nest,” his tone was teasing but he relented, sitting back on his haunches, “said experiment also proved that the person attempting to stop said projectile from aforementioned German sniper’s gun results in blood loss and a surprising amount of pain.”

            “You were shot?!” she was yelling now, horror flooding her, “where!”

            He moved gingerly now to pull away his coat from his left shoulder, wincing at the effort until she pushed his hand away to help him, “it’s not all bad.”

            “Sherlock!” she yelled again, realizing that his uniform beneath was soaked with his blood at the shoulder, hidden from her view by his thick overcoat. There was no exit wound, which meant the bullet was still inside him, serving as a stopper, but it would have to come out. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

            “I needed you in peace for a few moments,” he told her, shrugging out of his overcoat completely, “I needed to keep the war away from us.”

            “Darling mine,” she murmured, rising and she helped him rise up and sit on her coat, their positions changing now as she knelt at his feet, “you should’ve told me.”

            “I’m alright,” he told her, and they silently helped each other remove the uniform coat, but the pain was too much even for him.

            “Joanna!” she yelled for one of her nurses, “I need a cutting tray and sutures!”

            When she called for the nurse to bring her morphine, Sherlock looked at her with caution in his eyes and she knew, in her heart of hearts, she was the only person alive who was treated to the self-doubt in his eyes, “is that wise darling?”

            “I know,” she murmured, gingerly removing the shirt from his wound, his breath hissing in pain, “I’m sorry,” she told him, “you’re with me, I won’t let you get lost in morphine darling,” she told him, accepting the tray from her nurse, uncaring at what Joanna thought as she treated her lover’s gunshot wound, pressing kisses to his bare skin, “I don’t think you can handle the pain, I’m going to have to dig the bullet out,” she told him.

            “Christ,” he breathed, pale beneath the tan he’d acquired from his new occupation as a soldier, his forehead covered with cold sweat from the pain as she began preparing a needle full of morphine, “I trust you Molly Hooper.”

            She injected him after disinfecting his arm, looking up at him and watched the drug take effect quickly, helping him lay back on the cot, “I have you,” she murmured to him, his eyes fluttering shut as she began preparing to dig the bullet out, “you’re safe with me.”

            “My Molly,” he murmured before slipping into unconsciousness.

            She and Joanna worked in silence for a few moments, the only words spoken between them were Molly asking for instruments that were handed to her with practiced precision and care. “This is your fella then?” Joanna finally asked, “the reason you joined the war?”  
            “Yes,” Molly said distractedly, trying to stifle the flow of blood.

            “He’s quite handsome,” Joanna told her.

            “He’s the most perfect creature that ever walked the earth,” Molly assured her nurse.

            The procedure didn’t take long to complete, the wound sown with perfect dexterity, a stark white bandage covering his shoulder and arm. When Sherlock regained consciousness some time later, endless, countless hours it seemed, he was still on Molly’s cot. He turned his head and saw that she was nestled against his good arm, her cheek against his bare skin, one arm wrapped protectively around his waist, her lips against his chest.

            _Peace_.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enjoy! xx

            He didn’t know how long he slept, he didn’t even know whether he’d slept or been unconscious as a result of the morphine he’d been given. But when he regained consciousness, when he felt the synapses of his mind slowly starting to fire, he woke up in a darkened, unfamiliar room. He barely remembered his own name, didn’t really understand where he was or what he was about, the only thing he really understood was that Molly’s warmth was missing from him, that she wasn’t there.

            “Molly!” he roared her name, sitting up only to fall back on the thin cot, his shoulder screaming in protest, the stitches tugging at his skin. He fell back with a gasp, panic filling his mind as he tried to regain himself, his jumbled mind unsettling him, nothing making sense as he felt out of control, unbalanced. He needed to sit up, he needed to figure out where he was, where his Molly was. He struggled up into a sitting position, grunting in pain but determined, blinking blindly in the darkness, hoping for some reprieve.

            What if something had happened to her?

            Where was she?           

            Where was _he_?

            _Molly_ …  
            He could smell her on his shoulder, the familiar scent of her skin on his shoulder where she’d been laying against him. Some logical part of him knew it was a phantom spell, conjured up by a combination of the morphine, pain, the trauma of the past few months, and the reality of Molly.

            _Molly._

            The door flew open and light poured in, and his Molly ran in, bringing in light with her as she always did, “I’m here,” she told him, taking the room in several long strides, cupping his jaw in her palm as if she knew he needed her touch, needed her skin to bring back his sanity, “I’m sorry, I just stepped away from a few moments,” her voice was soft and firm, because she knew he needed her to be strong, needed her to be calm as his thoughts returned to him. He closed his eyes, nuzzling her palm, listening to her calming voice, “I didn’t think you’d wake up so early darling or I wouldn’t have left you but I needed to check in with my other patients. One of them developed complications from a wound and I have to decide what to do for him,” she was stroking his jaw with her thumb in that hypnotic, soothing way, “are you in much pain, love?”

            He shook his head, grateful for her question that forced him to refocus, “no,” he told her after he sent out his thoughts and touched every part of himself to see how he felt, “there’s pain,” he told her honestly, “but I can handle it, I think. I’d rather not rely on morphine.”

            Molly’s fingers were gentle as she brushed his hair away from his forehead, her eyes lovely, the softness he craved in her eyes, the softness that told him she loved him, and always would, no matter what. He gripped her wrist with his good hand, running his thumb over the delicate tracing of veins there, closing his eyes and letting his senses be flooded with Molly. “Alright,” she murmured, “but if the pain gets too much—”

            “I’ll tell you,” he promised, turning his face into her palm and nuzzling her with his lips, “how long have I been sleeping?”  
            “Nearly sixteen hours,” she told him, “you lost a lot of blood, the damage to your shoulder is more extensive then I thought. I think the best thing for you to do is take some time away to recover darling.”

            Sherlock was already shaking his head, “I can’t,” he told her resolutely.

            “You can,” she told him, more stubborn than he was, “and you will, because I’m telling you. And I’ve already contacted your brother. You’re going to Rouen for a week of convalescence.”

            “A _week_ in Rouen?” he rolled his eyes, horrified at the prospect, “Christ, I will die of boredom! How can you do this to me, Molly? I thought you were dedicated to the sanctity of life, particularly mine.”

            Her laughter was soft, music to his tired ears and he couldn’t help pressing his ear to her throat to hear her laughter better. The chaotic cacophony of the war machine, the unbelievable noise in the trenches had deprived his ears of auditory pleasantries. He spent countless hours listening to the monotonous sounds of death and destruction, desperate for the soft plucking of cat-gut violin strings on his Stradivarius and Molly’s soft voice in a dark room, whispering intimate things to him. To hear her laughter now reminded him of the pleasures sound could bring a man, the most deprived and overused sense. “A week in Rouen,” she was telling him, holding him against her chest, turning her head to bless his forehead with a kiss, “with _me,_ Holmes,” he could feel her smile against his forehead.

            He jerked up to look at her so fast that pain from his shoulder radiated through his entire body, shocking him but his heart was beating too fast for him to notice, joy overriding everything else in his body, “with _you,_ Hooper?”

            She chuckled, “if you find that objectionable Captain Holmes, I’m sure I can arrange to be in another part of France for my week off.”

            “You do that Molly, _Captain_ Hooper, and I’ll find you and—” but he couldn’t finish his sentence.

            Her laughter told him she’d read his thoughts, had finished the sentence he couldn’t finish, “I’d like to see you try,” she teased, pressing her lips to his, pulling away before he could deepen the contact, hungry, _dying_ for her. A man trapped in the desert and Molly his oasis, a fresh water stream for him to life on, “our transportation has been dully and dutifully arranged for tomorrow morning,” she told him, “giving me enough time to tie up loose ends here. Now, lay back my love, get some rest.”

            Sherlock knew it was futile to protest, to try and talk Molly out of something so he let her lay him back on the cot, grinning up at her like a fool when she kissed his forehead, “I love you,” she told him, looming over him like his very own angel of mercy, empress of joy, his goddess of love, his very heart.

            “I love you,” he managed to murmur around the lump of emotion in his throat, chocked by the pleasantly unfamiliar sensation of being emotionally honest.

            Sherlock drifted off into sleep with Molly’s kisses on his closed eyelids and dreamt of a week in Rouen with his Molly, away from the war, away from reality.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enjoy!

            The ride to Rouen was miserable for Sherlock, and Molly tried her best to make him as comfortable as she could. He slept fitfully against her shoulder on the train, his fingers intertwined with her, resting in her lap with her other arm wrapped his shoulders, holding him securely against her. She murmured to him when he was startled out of sleep, helping him sip chamomile tea in hopes that it would help ease the pain. “You’re alright love,” she told him, “I have morphine if you’d like it, if ever.”

            He turned his face, eyes squeezed shut, into her shoulder, “not yet,” he murmured, his breath becoming deep and measured as he slipped back into sleep.

            Molly memorized his sleeping face, committing every detail to memory from his thick, slashing brows to his ridiculously long, naturally curled, inexplicably pale eyelashes, to his high, sharp cheekbones, the blunt tip of his nose, and his lips that seemed to have been molded into perfection. He was beautiful when he was awake and animated with his sparkling energy, in repose he was devastating. An alabaster god with those slicked back curls and eyes that seemed to shift colors depending on his mood or light, she wasn’t sure which.

            Love for him, affection and hunger for his mind, for his words, his voice, his skin, his very soul burned through her with unsettling obsession. The unsettling insanity, the sense of instability felt like fingertips over her spine. Even the phantom sensation felt like him, felt like Sherlock’s fingertips traveling over her bare skin, touching her skin, marking every vertebra as his.

            The picture they cut was scandalous and peculiar, she knew. An unmarried woman in a private train car with an unmarried man, and so blatantly intimate together. What made it more peculiar was that she made no attempt to hide the fact that they were together, as if she didn’t care what anyone thought of their relationship, or whether or not it was appropriate. Even before the war, Molly had never been overly concerned with societal expectations of her as a woman, defying and defining femininity in her own image. She knew if she’d cared, she would not have been able to become a doctor or have joined the war effort as a surgeon and officer to be near her Sherlock.

            So she held her love against her, comforted him, loved him, and smiled at the porters and ticket inspectors that went through the car, greeted the acquaintances and fellow officers that they’d encountered on the platform. She hadn’t thought of letting go of his arm for one second, smiling to herself as he stood straight backed in his uniform, his arm in a sling, the expression on his face bored, intelligent, arrogant. She had to admit she missed his long curls that were now replaced with the slicked back, more official, severe look but it didn’t matter. He was still her man.

            Her Sherlock.

            Her darling love.

            Seven days in Rouen, with him.

            Seven days in his arms, in a clean hotel room, with hot water and baths on regular basis, clean sheets.

And him.

            She laughed to herself, wondering if she was more excited at the prospect of being alone with her love for a week, or intrigued at being away from the war, with her own private space and importantly, hot, clean water.

            War made such mundane things seem so terribly important. Things she had neglected like a good mattress, uninterrupted baths, the feeling of being _clean_ , shampooing her hair, hot food, hot coffee….God, just coffee…and if things as insignificant as coffee could be elevated to be worth more than all the money in the world, than the clarity war offered on the important things like love were unmatched, unparalleled.

            Molly gently ran her nails across her love’s scalp, knowing how much he loved the sensation though he was loath to admit it, practically purring like a cat even in his sleep…well, a great, sleek jaguar rather than a tabby. But he purred nonetheless, and she grinned.

            How could she care what anyone else thought of their relationship, of their love affair? What business was it of theirs whether or not she and Sherlock were married?

            What did it matter when there was all this devastation, all this ugliness, and suffering? How could it matter?

            She pressed a kiss to his forehead and his eyes opened, and not for the first time she was frozen, mesmerized by his cat-like, pale eyes brighter than the sun as he looked up at her. “Where are we?” he murmured, wrapping both arms around her waist, glancing out of the window as he pressed his cheek against her chest.

            “No idea,” she laughed softly, “not Rouen.”

            His smile was sleepy, even as he winced before he straightened up, nursing his arm with a grunt, “Christ, it feels like we’ve been on this damned train for ages,” he winced again, resettling as he stretched his long legs on the seat opposite him.

            “Patience,” she smiled, taking the opportunity to stretch her back since she’d been in a cramped position over him for countless hours, not that she was complaining.

            “I have no patience when it comes to you Molly Hooper,” he told her, in that perpetually bored, aristocratic tone with his perfect, posh English that she adored, “I’ve lived lifetimes in mud and trenches, facing German guns and artillery, imagining you in every wisp of smoke, dreaming of your skin every second of slumber I can find, never tasting anything on my tongue except you. And now you ask for patience I never had,” he rolled his eyes, “if there was only a latch on the carriage door…”

            Molly laughed, taking his hand in hers and kissing the inside of his palm, “car door.”

            “What?”  
            “They’re train cars darling, remember your client that liked trains? He told us they’re train _cars_ ,” she smiled at him.

            “Ah,” he rolled his eyes, “how do you remember that?”

            “How do you not?” she chuckled, grinning into his eyes as he looked at her with the most tortured look, “you remember everything!”

            “Now isn’t that a bit of an exaggeration? That I remember _everything_?”

            “Well,” she raised a brow, staring him down, “seeing as how you’re the one who claims to never forget any piece of information, I cannot claim the exaggeration is of my own making.”

            “I never claim to remember everything Hooper, only vital pieces of information,” he murmured, settling back in his seat against the window, watching her in a way that told her he was deducing something, his mind rushing forward in leaps and bounds. Or maybe he was remember something, because his expression softened as he watched her, heartbeats passing between them.

            “What pieces of information do you file away as ‘vital’ then?” she smiled, at him, reaching up to brush her fingers over his beautiful lips, “if not the movement of the planets or information given to you by a client.”

            He caught her hand in his, his massive hand, those long fingers enveloping hers as he brought her hand to his lips, “irrelevant whether the Earth rotates around the sun or in circles around the garden like teddy bears,” he pressed kisses to his knuckle, “or whether some train obsessed client told us they’re called ‘cars’ not ‘carriages’. Vital information for me,” he pulled on her hand, urging her to sit in his lap, smiling as he nuzzled her jaw, “is that when I kiss you here you, you make the loveliest gasping sound. Or when you’re deep in thought, you tend to frown and the sweetest crease furrows your brow. When you’re anxious, you stand up and pace the room, like a caged tigress. Sitting annoys you. When I touch my fingertips to your spine you shiver, when you sit in my lap you melt into me. When you look into my eyes darling,” he smiled as he kissed the base of her throat, dipping his tongue into the hollow there, “the world realigns.”

            “I love you,” Molly smiled, stroking his cheek.

            “I love you, Molly Hooper,” he murmured, “and that’s all I need to know, apparently.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone!  
> I hope you enjoy the following! Just wanted to let you I'm bumping up the ratings for the fic, just in case...
> 
> Let me know what you think! xx

            There was a car waiting for them at the train station, and she could only imagine the pain Sherlock was in because he didn’t protest when she wrapped her arm around his waist and supported him to the car, his breath shaky, skin the color of pristine white sheets by the time he climbed into the car. They waited patiently, with Molly pressing her palm to his clammy forehead to see if he had a fever (he didn’t, thank God), for their chauffer, a young corporal, to stop saluting them long enough to load their luggage into the car and drive them to the hotel.

            Mycroft had told Molly in his cable the previous day that the hotel was used by high-ranking officers and VIPs to recuperate from the war. While their injuries weren’t necessarily war-related, most of them seeking the social aspect of the hotel rather than the recuperation, the hotel was nice and clean and far enough away from the trenches. As they heard the air raid sirens followed by explosions in the distance, Molly decided it wasn’t far enough away.

            She tightened her grip on Sherlock’s hand, the familiar terror of war settling into her bosom, closing off her oxygen as it often did when she thought about the war. About the bombs, the people beneath the bombs, the people launching the bombs, the aftermath of those bombs, both short term and long term…if they ever made it to the long term. Molly often fantasized about escaping the war, running away with Sherlock to some part of the world that wasn’t affected by the war, where air raid sirens weren’t an every day occurrence, where families didn’t need to drill to prepare for incoming artillery, where young men lived to become old men with gray beards.

            “Where did you go?” Sherlock’s voice was gentle, his fingers touching her jaw to get her attention, the concern she saw in his eyes told her she’d been lost for a few minutes.

            Tears stung her eyes and she blinked them away, “somewhere peaceful and quiet,” she told him, “somewhere without war, without the noise, without the smoke and terror.”

            “Sounds like a lovely place,” he brushed his thumb to her lips, grunting as he tried to sit up to kiss her but his shoulder held him back, “somewhere around 1910, 1911 wouldn’t you say?”

            Molly smiled for him, kissing the pad of his thumb, “somewhere in that neighborhood.”

            His sudden bark of a laugh was a surprising, pleasing sound in the quiet car, “but know us, Molly Hooper, and the work we were doing in 1910, 1911, finding the war in London where there wasn’t one—”

            “We are a pair,” she laughed, leaning against his chest, grateful she could lean into his warmth with his bad shoulder safely tucked against the car door, “but it was contained chaos. This is—”

            “Madness,” he murmured, his fingers in her hair, “mindless, purposeless, insanity on a global scale of stupidity.”

            When they arrived, they were greeted like royalty as they entered the hotel to check in. She wasn’t sure whether it was Sherlock’s fame before the war, the great consulting detective that John Watson’s articles for _The Strand_ had praised, or their ranks that brought such respect but whatever it was, it garnered them both a lot of attention. Molly shrunk against his arm, her fingers digging into his forearm as she tried to look like a woman with enough confidence to be romantically involved with Sherlock Holmes.

            Sherlock, predictably, bloomed at the attention he received. She could tell he liked the attention because she knew him like the back of her hand, because she could read his thoughts even when he used every trick he knew to disguise what he felt. She knew he was elated at the attention now, enjoying the way everyone approached him and asked him about his arm in the sling, asking where he was stationed, what he was doing. Sherlock looked bored, rolling his eyes, his responses quick and often curt, if not outright rude. His big hand never left the small of her back, she could feel his thumb rubbing circles against the material of her military uniform, but oh he enjoyed the attention.

            _Captain Holmes._

            She always felt like she was standing in the ray of the brightest sunshine on the most gorgeous summer day in London when she was with Sherlock. He always tended to frown and scowl at friends and acquaintances alike, reserving his smile for her, often looking down at her with an expression that went from a disappointed frown to a broad, multi-chinned grin that lined his face with laugh lines. The smile that always made her want to cuddle close to his chest, to kiss those laugh lines that reminded her of his humanity, his sense of humor, however dark it tended to be.

            Molly’s hand was in the crook of his arm, and she stood by rather passively, counting down the seconds till they could get to their room upstairs and just… _be_. “Captain Holmes,” someone new had approached them, cutting off their hasty exit towards the stairs that would take them upstairs. She smiled absently, not listening to the introductions that were made, “ah! This must be Mrs. Holmes!”

            Somehow, this man was the first person they’d met who had assumed she was Mrs. Holmes, and something warm bloomed in her chest, as if some warmth was injected beneath her skin, something happy in the pit of her stomach that made her shiver. The thought of being his wife, the thought of being his for all the world to know…she was an independent, strong woman, she knew that. Everything she did spoke of her ability to be self-sustaining, self-assured. But when it came to Sherlock, she didn’t mind being dependent on him. Didn’t mind admitting she was wake if only to lean on his strength, the way he leaned on her.

            But Sherlock’s laugh brought her out of her reverie, “Christ no,” he was laughing, “don’t be absurd. This Dr. Hooper, currently Captain Hooper.”

            Molly lost her voice as she mechanically shook the man’s hand, wondering why the idea of her being his wife was so comical, so absurd as he’d said it. Sherlock’s laugh rang in her ears as the man, a colonel she quickly noted, having missed his name, looked at her curiously, “a doctor _and_ captain?”

            “I’m with the medical corps,” she told him, managing not to stammer somehow, “surgeon.”

            The colonel said something about how impressive she was and what an honor it was. Apparently he’d heard about the female surgeon with the British military, the one that ran a hospital more efficiently than any man in the military. But she didn’t hear him, her love’s derisive laugh had blocked all her hearing it seemed.

            _Absurd_.           

            It wasn’t that she had any delusions about Sherlock and their relationship. They loved each other, and they had arrived at the conclusion after arduous soul-searching and in Sherlock’s case, mind searching, to get to this particular point in their relationship. She was no fool, she knew he didn’t believe in marriage or the concept of a woman and man being tied together for eternity in the eyes of man. It had taken him five years to realize he had feelings for her, two more after that to admit that he loved her. She knew it would take another decade for them to even think about marriage.

            And yet…

            As she followed him up the stairs to their room, she’d been hoping that at least the thought of being married to her wasn’t absurd anymore. After all they’d been together, after all that she’d done for him…following him into the war, following him into battle…

            _Absurd_.

            “What’s wrong? You haven’t said a word since Colonel Richardson,” he was saying as he closed the door behind them in the hotel room, and Molly realized she was sitting ramrod straight on the edge of the bed, looking out of the window that was covered with blackout sheets.

            “Hmm?” she glanced up, “oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize,” she murmured. That self-destructive part of her that loved him, that adored him, refused to let him see her pain, see her hurt at his words and she shook the thoughts away, trying to not let them cloud her eyes as she watched him unbutton his coat. She stood up, walking towards him to help him, “must just be tired.”

            “I find it absolutely hilarious that you think you can fool me, Molly Hooper,” he smiled, bending down slightly to allow her to help him out of the sling, “but wherever your thoughts are straying, I dislike the clouds,” he pressed his lips to her forehead as she reached up to untie the sling from behind his head, “I want the frowns and heartaches away from us.”

            Molly’s eyes fluttered shut at his words, wondering how he could go from declaring the idea of marriage to her absurd to saying things that made her entire spirit sigh with relief, with joy at his words, at the affectionate way he looked at her. “Yes,” she agreed, “leave the heartaches in the trenches where they belong darling, for the next few days, I would see you smile.”

            He grinned wolfishly as she took his jacket off for him, tender with his injured shoulder even as he watched her as if she were the only thing in the universe for him to watch, as if he had already undressed her and spread her beneath him on the bed. “My smile’s are yours alone Molly.”

            “It’s a currency I do not know how to spend,” she grinned, kissing his chin, “but first a bath, then have a lie down, yeah? You’re in so much pain darling, I wish you’d let me give you at least one grain of morphine.”

            But he was already shaking his head, “you and a hot bath, that’s all I require.”

            “Defying doctor’s orders?”

            He laughed, “no, I’m simply curing myself and my doctor in one fell swoop, killing two birds with a single stone. I would have your hands on my skin, and you want to ease my pain, therefore, a bath and _you_.”

            Molly grinned up at him, “then a bath and yours truly is what you will get, I’ll ring down,” but she couldn’t tear herself away from him long enough to call down for hot water. Her fingers rested against his chest where she’d been unbuttoning his green, military shirt, his skin warming her palm, his heartbeat a steady rhythm that she worshipped. It was with aching familiarity that she lifted her face for his kiss, that she watched him close the distance between them, his lips warm, familiar, his breath desperate as he pressed his lips to hers. There was something devastating in his kisses, something that broke her heart whenever he kissed her, that made tears sting her eyes. when she had discovered that he kissed her with his eyes open, she had been even more shocked at the intimacy, her own eyes always fluttering shut unable to keep them open as he kissed her.

            He teased her endlessly, that she couldn’t keep her eyes open, couldn’t watch him while he kissed her the way he was able to watch her. it had taken her a while to understand that he enjoyed the sensory overload, but it overwhelmed him. She had managed to keep them open once, and she had begun to weep. The taste of him, the image of his beautiful, dear face so close to hers, the expression of fierce, endless concentration on his face as he slipped his tongue deep into her mouth…Before Sherlock, she’d only known hasty, shy kisses stolen by boys at garden parties who fumbled and giggled too much for her to understand what a kiss was.

            But then her Sherlock had come along, and taught her things, taught her sensations that she never understood, hadn’t even known existed.

            When they pulled away to breath, pressing their foreheads together as if any distance would destroy their worlds, both breathing heavily as he cupped her throat in one big hand, “my Molly,” was all he murmured, his pale eyes still watching her, never wavering away from her face as if deducing everything she felt, everything she thought.

            With a smile, she pushed herself away from her Sherlock, walking towards the telephone at last and ringing down for hot water, speaking to the concierge with her broken French, making Sherlock laugh at her very English accent. She rolled her eyes at him, of course Sherlock Holmes spoke French as if he’d been born and raised in the countryside.

            Molly was changing in their bedroom when the hot water was brought in for his bath, trading her military uniform to a comfortable house dress that she could move in. She looked with disdain at her brazier, throwing it back in her luggage and pulling the dress on over bare skin. She was rearranging her hair into a less a severe bun as she walked back into the main room, where the bathtub was settled for Sherlock.

            He glanced up at her, having been standing over the tub, hands on his hips with a thoughtful look on his face as he looked at the water, “you look comfortable,” he grinned, wearing his white shirt still though now it was open, revealing enticing glimpses of male skin beneath, his green trousers unbuckled and unbuttoned, his slicked back hair slightly disheveled.

            “I am,” she grinned, taking his hand as he extended it towards her, “now,” she slipped her hand beneath the open shirt, shivering as she touched his bare skin, “time to make your doctor’s dream come true.”

            “That sounds horrendously depraved,” his tone was dark as he watched her.

            “See,” she looked up at him, pushing his shirt off his shoulders, so very careful of his injury, pressing kisses to his collarbone as he hissed in pain when he had to lift his arm, “I’m sorry,” she murmured, “I’m sorry,” she kept repeating, peppering his upper chest and shoulders with kisses until she’d stripped him, “let’s keep the bandage on for now, I’ll wash it then get a clean one on after your bath.”

            His expression was closed, even she couldn’t read him as he regarded her, “this is astonishing,” he finally murmured as she helped him step out of his trousers, “you are being clinical, a level-headed doctor, a surgeon who removed pieces of shrapnel from my shoulder, concerned with my well-being as my attending physician. Your words are logical, your eyes are clear and not fogged by your emotions,” she slipped her hands beneath the waistband of his pants, slipping them down his long legs, trying not to moan at the sight of him, completely naked now, all hers, “and yet,” he touched the side of her face, hooking his finger beneath her chin and lifting her face to his, “your touch is intimate, the touch of a lover against her lovers, not the touch of Doctor Hooper but my Molly.”

            Molly couldn’t help herself, gripping his hips, her fingers digging into his warm skin, “because I’m your Molly before anything else,” she told him, “your Molly is a bit of a tyrant. When she’s near you, she scares everyone else away. The doctor is only allowed in the room because my Sherlock needs the doctor, otherwise,” she shook her head, “Only your Molly exists.”

            Sherlock didn’t say anything, letting her help him into the tub, making sure his chest stayed above the water to avoid getting the bandages unnecessarily wet. He hissed in satisfaction this time, the steaming hot water seemed to do its job and he sighed, all the tension in his body floating away with the water, disappearing with the steam. He cracked open an eye when she knelt by the tab, taking the bar of soap from its little container, “you’re not joining me?” he asked, his voice deep, his words nearly garbled as his baritone dropped a few octaves.

            Molly took her time answer, running the soap languidly over her lover’s exquisite body, committing to memory his strong, toned arms, the breadth of shoulders, the tight ropes of muscles in his stomach and chest, his thick thighs, long legs. “In a moment,” she told him finally, looking up to find his head back against the lip of the tub, eyes closed, “this is my fee,” she murmured, gripping his foot, running her fingers between his ridiculously long, somehow elegant toes.

            His smile was sleepy, “I have bad news darling,” he told her, “I may not be able to stay awake long enough to make love to you tonight.”

            She smiled, “that’s alright,” she whispered, not wanting to disrupt whatever peace he’d found in the hot water, “we have lifetimes.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enjoy!

            Sherlock was in pain.

            He woke up with a gasp of pain, dreaming of morphine, of the bliss of the drug that numbed his faculties and shut his brain down long enough for him to sleep through the night. Though he was loathe to admit it, he was devoted to the oath he’d made to Molly Hooper, that he would never use recreational drugs. Wincing as he tried to rearrange his injured shoulder, he reasoned that taking the morphine now wouldn’t be considered recreational but necessary to help him. He was, after all, wounded in the war and deserved some solace for his troubles. If King and Country saw fit to outfit him with free morphine, who was he but a humble subject to refuse such a kind offer?

            Molly shifted beneath the sheets next to him, making the softest sound, like a lazy kitten having found a sliver of sunshine she murmured in her slumber, her hand finding the center of his chest and resting it there. She nuzzled against his shoulder and settled again, sighing in contentment.

            Sherlock’s mind rapidly sifted and shifted through years of thoughts and memories, come to rest on the day he’d met Molly at the morgue in St. Bart’s. He had stormed into the catacomb-like morgue with Lestrade and Watson following him closely, demanding entrance and a chance to examine the corpse. Having become accustomed to being given free reign in the morgue by Anderson, whose spine was made of material flimsier than that of a jellyfish, he had been shocked when he’d been stopped in his tracks by London’s newest oddity: a diminutive surgeon with a temper, half his size, somehow more stubborn than he was.

            The female surgeon, as she was known, Dr. Molly Anne Hooper. As she’d stared him down in the morgue that day, explaining to him that since she oversaw the operations of St. Bart’s now, he would have to seek her permission before he and Watson would be allowed to touch anybody, living or dead, in the hospital. From that day on, after he’d watched her easily determine cause and time of death, her analyses curt and brief as she pointed out marks to him as if he had missed them, Sherlock insisted that she help him during investigations.

            Gradually, he had become impetuous when Dr. Hooper wasn’t in the morgue to assist him. He’d started sending messengers to her flat to demand her presence in the hospital, when she’d started refusing the messengers, he himself would find his way and drag her to the hospital. She was never shy about her displeasure at his demands, but she never refused him a favor. And soon enough, the brown, mousey Dr.  Hooper with the insignificantly brown and forgettable eyes had become Molly. It didn’t take long until she became _his_ Molly.

            Her smiles became easier around him, and she laughed more as they shared tea and coffee, standing side by side in her lab. She was reserved and quiet, often severe in her demeanor, around everyone else that crossed her lab. Sherlock understood the need for her severity, her strictness, relentlessness. She was, after all, a woman dominating in a man’s world. Any unnecessary softness or kindness would be seen as weakness in her, the weakness of a woman. Yet over time, she had allowed him to see the softness, allowed him to see the warmth she hid from everyone else.

            She’d shown him her heart, and it had horrified him. He’d tried to distance himself, had spent hours in his mind palace examining his reaction to her, wanting to understand the fluttering feeling, the hunger he felt when he merely thought about her. He had felt so overwhelmed, he didn’t even want to examine what he felt when he was physically around her. His heart raced, he got tunnel vision, his palms were sweaty, and he felt incapable of speaking with any intelligence.

            It had taken tea time with Mary Watson to understand what he felt for Molly, to understand why even the rainiest, foggiest London days were filled with sunshine when she was with him, when she stood next to him. He’d listened to Mary talk about John and he’d finally understood…whether he liked it or not, whether he agreed with his own analyses of his thoughts and physical reactions, whether he considered love and affection and emotions to be a fly in the ointment…he loved Molly Hooper.

            He’d hidden it from her, refusing to tell her but a dam had burst within him. In his darkest moment, having been touched by death, having felt its cold breath on the nape of his neck, he’d looked deep into those brown eyes and confessed all that he was, laying bare all that he was for her.

            When Sherlock kissed Molly that night, when she’d melted into his chest, when she’d groaned his name, sinking her fingers into his unruly curly hair, his name a whisper that penetrated the ice within him. She’d looked at him with wonder in her eyes, her smile soft, “I never thought—” she’d cut herself off, “Sherlock…”

            He’d lived in her arms ever since then, thrived as a man loved by a strong woman, finally slept in peace in her bed with her kisses burning his skin. He missed her with a desperation he couldn’t articulate, had to lock down his muscles to keep himself from running to her and falling to his knees before her whenever he saw her. Sherlock remembered the first time Molly had called him darling, remembered the way he’d carried her to his bedroom at 221B, a man possessed as he’d sunk himself inside her love.

            He glanced down at her now, this woman that had followed him to the pits of hell. How could he betray the vow he’d made to her? This woman that had nursed him through his last relapse with a patience that no one else had for him, her hands gentle as she’d wiped the sweat from his brow, her words gentle as he’d vomited out the poison from his body. She’d never judged him, never held a grudge against him, her only demand had been that he never touch morphine or cocaine ever again.

            Physical pain he could endure, disappointment in Molly’s eyes…

            Like the disappointment he’d seen after his conversation with Colonel Richardson. He wracked his brain trying to understand what had colored her expression with such sadness, that had silence her words but he couldn’t pinpoint the moment.

            “Sherlock,” her voice penetrated the fog in his mind, soft and sleepy, “are you in pain?” she murmured, and he glanced down to find her watch him with a frown.

            “It twinges a bit,” he told her, having found that honest with Molly Hooper was the greatest gift he could give her, “and no, I don’t want the morphine. I’m determined.”

            “I know you are love,” she pressed a kiss to his bicep, her hand rubbing soothing circles against his bare chest, “and I support you, but I’d rather you not be in so much pain.”   

            “Well, you know,” he grinned at the ceiling, knowing she was the only human capable of bringing that expression to his face, gripping her hand with his as it lay over his chest, “it is said that the greatest natural pain reliever is sexual release.”

            “Is this your way of romancing me, Mr. Holmes?” her smile was sleepy as she glanced up at him, running her hand down his chest, her finger tracing the muscles in his stomach, her touch light and yet so familiar, her arched into her touch.

            “Romance,” he rolled his eyes, “there’s no such. Just a gimmick by salesmen to help them sell snake oil and perfume.”

            Laughing, Molly raised herself up on her elbow, looming over him, “then why do you insist on buying that expensive perfume for me from Paris? Never letting me wearing anything else, or even think about refusing your month gift.”

            “Because,” he managed to lift his arm enough to cup her throat in his palm, pressing his open mouth to her slim throat, “only the gold and diamonds should touch your skin Molly, only the best products, exclusively had picked for you.”

            It was her turn to roll her eyes at him, her hair impossibly long when she let it loose around her shoulders, her face clean and shining in the dim room. He’d been so ignorant, thinking her eyes were just brown, her hair just brown, her skin plain, her mouth insignificant…he’d been spectacularly wrong. He touched the tip of his tongue to her skin, tasting her familiarity.

            _How_ …

“Flatterer,” she laughed, her palm warm against his skin as she slipped her leg between his, rubbing her thigh between his, “darling, all you have to do is kiss me and I’m yours.”

            He frowned up at her, “you think I’m saying these things to get you in bed with me?”  
            “Aren’t…you?” she blinked at him.

            “Oh Molly, how little you know me,” he shook his head, disappointed that he still hadn’t convinced her his feelings were true, that what he felt for her was genuine affection, affection beyond anything he’d ever experienced before, “I do not need to flatter you. All I have to do is be observant, simply watch you, know you. You’re the most extraordinary person I’ve met outside myself,” he chuckled, “a singularly unique person, smart, beautiful, wonderful, in everything you do. Why should you wear anything ordinary? Say anything ordinary when you are so—”

            “Abnormal?”

            “ _Extraordinary_ ,” he insisted, “Molly—” his throat tightened, words evading him. He felt incomplete as he looked up at her, unable to express himself, to understand the warmth he always seemed to feel around Molly. He often remembered James Moriarty’s words when he had taken Molly hostage, when he had used her to get to Sherlock, insisting that he would burn Sherlock’s heart. How had Moriarty understood that she was his heart, what had allowed him that knowledge, knowledge that had confounded Sherlock for so long?

            His breath left him, the only thing he could say was her name on a sigh as he sought her lips with his, “Molly,” he gasped and as always, she understood him, her fingers soft against his jaw as she stroked his face, kissing him slowly as she straddled him on the bed, her hand between their bodies, finding him through his pants.

            “It might be better if you’re on top,” she breathed between the open mouth kisses she peppered across his neck, his jaw, wending her way down to his chest and stopping his heart, “I don’t want to hurt you.”

            He cupped the back of her head, his fingers sifting through her hair as she kissed him, sucking his skin into her mouth, nibbling on him as her hand traveled between their bodies, between his legs, “you could never,” he said in a foreign voice, and his universe was reduced to his Molly.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mature content below- reader discretion advised!

            As Sherlock watched his Molly, he wondered if he would ever get used to the sight of her astride him, naked and beautiful, so lost in her ecstasy, a frown of concentration puckering her brow, her hair wild around her shoulders as her inner muscles clenched and squeezed around him. He always thought she couldn’t mean more to him, that there was no way their lovemaking could improve, that it couldn’t get any better than _this_ moment in her arms, _this_ heartbeat inside her warmth, _this_ sigh against her skin, _this_ heavenly breath as she orgasmed atop him.

            Oh, he did live for the way her fingernails dug into his chest, grateful that they’d decided it would be better for his shoulder if she were atop him. Of course, he wanted to lift his head, to taste her rosy, puckered nipples as she cried out his name with that surprised, gasping inflection as her warmth surrounded him in the most inexplicable way. She always sounded surprised when she came, riding the crest, her frown of concentration melting into one of painful ecstasy until a euphoric, secret smile lifted the corner of her bruised lips.

            _My Molly_.

            He dug his fingers into her sides, bruising her soft flesh, knowing he would leave marks (he always did) but he couldn’t help himself. He could feel his orgasm barreling towards him, building into a crescendo with each thrust, the tightness at the small of his back, the tingling sensation in his skull, the inexplicable knowledge that because Molly had orgasmed, he would too now…now… _Molly_.

            How beautiful she was, how breathtaking as she watched him, as she leaned down to kiss him slowly, knowing just how to touch him, how to ride him to bring his orgasm…an out of control freight train now, making him sweat, making him grind his teeth and grunt into her mouth like an animal…reduced to basic biology…wanting to spill his seed deep inside his woman’s womb…wanting to draw out this moment between for ages…gasping into his Molly mouth, their bodies connected, fused together.

            But he couldn’t last, he couldn’t…not with the way she was looking down at him as if he held the universe in his fingertips, not when she clenched her wet heat around him with every downward thrust and lifted him to the rafters, not when she pressed her swollen lips to his throat and whispered his name. She was his universe and he let go, hearing his own loud moan of pleasure, the pain in his shoulder ignored as he automatically reached up for Molly, unaware of whether or not he was pulling her hair too hard, biting her lip too hard as waves of pleasure made him buck and grunt into her, his hips thrusting deep inside her…

            _Molly_ … _Molly…Molly…my Molly._

            She collapsed against his chest, careful not to irritate his injured shoulder as she nestled against him, curling her strong, slender fingers into the hair on his chest as they breathed together, their bodies still connected. He pressed his cheek against his forehead, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath, loathing the moment he would slip out of her, lose her heat…until the next time anyway. But Christ, how he hated the post-orgasm moment when he was left without her secret warmth.

            Molly made a sound that made the barbarian in him rise and take notice, nearly beating his chest with pride at the satisfied, sleepy smile on her lips, “making love is bound to lose its charm, doesn’t it?”

            He would never admit it, but it took him a few minutes to find his voice, to speak without fearing that his voice would crack, “it’s bound to, as with all chemical reactions. Our bodies will one day simply want more of the chemicals that produce orgasms, and sex will become just another dull activity. Our orgasms will have to become more and more powerful in order to keep sex interesting.”

            She rose above him on her elbow, her hair a beautiful, messy halo around them, the long, golden brown strands ropes that bound him, that found their way to cling to the stubble on his jaw, the hairs on his chest and stomach, even under his arms. She never seemed to mind, and he felt thoroughly possessed by her, bound as he was by her hair. “You’re saying, in your own way, that we must start becoming more…inventive with our lovemaking, or risk growing tired of each other?” she raised her brow, “how do you keep lovemaking new? I mean…” and he watched with a deeply satisfied smile as a blush crept from her breasts, to her shoulders, kissing her cheeks. She was naked, with his semen most likely dribbling down the inside of her thighs, naked against him, yet she blushed.

            And he had to remind herself that Molly had been a virgin. That he was her first lover.

            Sherlock reached up, mysterious tenderness animating him as he touched her cheek, her bruised lips, “there are many ways to keep sex interesting,” he murmured, instantly wishing he’d called it lovemaking, wishing he could ease this moment of awkwardness for her, “there is much I still have to teach you about the love play, let us call it.”

            She turned her face into his palm, brushing her open, wet mouth against his palm and he wondered if she knew that the hands were the most sensual part of a human being. As a doctor, she probably knew that the hands were sensitive due to the innumerable nerve endings that created the hand. But was she aware of it, as a lover? Or was it by pure instinct that she darted her pink tongue over his palm, between his fingers now? Was it instinct that she orgasmed harder and faster when he used his fingers?

            “We have lifetimes,” she smiled against his hand.          

            As if to remind of them of their situation, artillery began to fire off in the distance, the cacophony of war replacing the music of lovemaking in their room, in the cocoon they’d created for themselves. He vaguely wondered if the artillery had been ongoing, and he’d been too distracted by his Molly to notice it. “Ages,” he told her, lifting his head to kiss her, to wipe away the sudden alarm in her brown eyes, as if she too had just remembered the war.

            “Oh Sherlock,” she sighed into his mouth, pushing him on his back gently, “I’ll never get enough of you,” she told him, and lithely rose from the bed, wrapping the sheet around her in modesty as she padded towards the bath. He watched with interest through the open door as she used a wet washcloth between her thighs, bringing one back for him, making him smile as she gently cleaned him too.

            He held her as she slept, her breathing growing steadier, her body heavier against his side as she drifted off and he found himself transported in time again. Vaguely wondering if all humans experienced this level of sentimentality during war time, or if it was simply a combination of blood loss and trauma from his wound and the affects of lovemaking that made him constantly sentimental these days. He didn’t have the energy to fight it. Safe as he was in Molly’s bed, he closed his eyes, surrounded by her scent and descended into his mind palace, finding the door that kept his memories of her first time…their first time.

            The rooms and caverns of his mind palace were reserved for only the most precious of memories and bits of information, the most valued and productive pieces he could imagine keeping in there. He willingly and deliberately deleted useless things like algebra and physics from his mind palace, even the obliquity of the ecliptic which he had struggled so nobly to understand. But all of his memories of Molly he kept in a suite of rooms he’d created just for her. Designed after the most beautiful rooms in the Palace of Versailles, each door in Molly’s suite in his mind palace held precious memories of her.

            He opened the door that led to her first time and saw how shy she’d been…

            _It was one of the colder, rainier days in London. The entire week had been overcast, the rain that had been threatening with ominous clouds for the past four days had finally relented in a torrent that made even a five-minute walk outside impossible. The streets were empty, silent, devoid even of the occasional automobile as thunder rolled through the city. Everyone had decided remaining inside was best for business. Even criminals, which was bad for business, as far as Sherlock was concerned._

_Usually, quiet days like this, when London’s seedy underbelly had been forced to remain inside and doing somewhat legal things, he would be losing his mind, bored, itching to find a seven percent solution or better yet, morphine that would render time useless and impotent._

_Not today._

_He was looking down the street from the window at Baker Street, contemplating._

_Fresh from his defeat of Professor Moriarty, having found some semblance of peace in Molly’s heart, he found himself less eager for a fight, less eager for his two favorite solutions, and more eager for Molly’s company. As fresh as their relationship was, the uneasy treaty he’d forged with his feelings and emotions were even more fresh, raw, and he knew Molly was a saint for having to put up with him._

_Mary Watson made sure he knew that._

_Shyly, sweetly, blushing to the roots of her hair, his Molly had reached up to kiss him in the privacy of her office in the hospital, asking if he would finally mark her, if he’d finally take her. Her words had sent shivers throughout his body, hardening him instantly, “I want you to make me yours, take my body and claim it as no one else has. Mark me as no one else has, please Sherlock?”_

_Through the haze of her words he’d tried to argue with her, that for a woman in her station, her social standing, she had to remain a virgin until she married. She’d blinked up at him, erased the inexplicable hurt his words had caused in her eyes, thinking that he’d missed the way she’d jerked back in surprise at his mention of her wedding night. He hadn’t understood her surprise, too caught up in the argument about the utility of keeping her virginity intact. But she was more stubborn then he was, “it’s you Sherlock, it will always be you.”_

_As in all the things they did, they planned their moment with meticulous care. Sherlock hesitantly asking Watson what precautions he had to take with her. He’d had numerous lovers throughout his life therefore he was familiar with contraceptives, but he’d never taken a virgin, he’d never taken someone he cared so deeply about. Watson hadn’t hidden his surprise but hadn’t kept anything from Sherlock either. Clearing his throat every few seconds and blushing furiously at the topic, he had given Sherlock advice about what a woman’s first time was like. But as they’d sat in Baker Street, as Sherlock had slowly started losing his patience with his best friend, it had dawned on him that the best person to ask was Mary._

_Mary had smiled in that gentle, lovely way of hers, put her hand on his and squeezed encouragingly, “the fact that you care at all about her experience is telling enough,” she had sat back, her smile full of pride as Sherlock had growled in insolence, unable to handle the compliment that he was thoughtful. “Take your time with her, listen to what she’s asking for, be gentle with her, and understand how difficult it is for a woman to share her body for the first time. If she asks you to stop, stop. If she cries, be patient with her. Afterwards, make sure to clean up her thighs, there might be blood. And for God’s sake, don’t leave her alone in bed the next morning to go off galivanting through London. She’ll be sore, run a bath for her.”_

_He’d taken the advice to heart, walking through London in a haze after his conversation with Mary and wondering if he could be the lover Molly needed for her first time. He was beginning to worry that he wasn’t._

_Molly, in her way, had been researching anatomy and trying to understand her own biology better. She knew everything there was to know, and being a bold woman, she had even familiarized herself with her body, with what she responded to, what she liked and didn’t like. She felt like a perfect little harlot but there was something empowering about touching her own flesh, about the way she jumped at her own touch, the silky wetness she’d felt with her fingers as she’d thought about Sherlock…There was the ridiculous, Puritan expression, that a man_ knew _a woman…And Sherlock would know her, as no one else did._

_She jabbered on nervously, walking through her lab as she’d helped him with a case, mere days after Moriarty had kidnapped her and used her as bait to get to Sherlock. “Most women aren’t aware but their hymen is usually already breached,” she told him, using a strange looking instrument only she knew how to use to spread the ribs of the man on her slab, “from horse riding or straddling something unknowingly or sitting hard on something,” and he listened with horrified fascination, “so virginity is, if you think about it, a social construct. Losing one’s virginity to a horse saddle sounds less satisfying than losing your virginity to—” her eyes had darted up to his._

_“Me,” he’d grinned wolfishly, unable to help himself, he’d kissed her breath into her lungs. “They’re going to take you for a witch if you keep talking like that,” he’d murmured._

_She’d grinned proudly at him, “you’ll keep me safe.”_

_Clinical out of anxiety, they’d set a date._

_He’d brazenly gone to her flat a few nights before their set date. It had been past midnight as he’d taken to the street, only Sherlock Holmes and London’s most prolific serial killers had been on the pavements, as he’d made his way into her flat, breaking in and sneaking up to her bedroom without disturbing her housekeeper._

_He’d kissed his Molly slowly that night, wanting to take her but knowing she wasn’t quite ready, he’d slipped his fingers inside her to simply give them both something to remember. She’d been sitting in his lap in her bed, her nightgown around her hips, her legs wide open as he’d held her from behind, as he’d soothed her, smiling when she’d guided his fingers deep inside herself and she’d had her first orgasm._

_Perhaps it was bad form to lick her so intimately during her first time, her first exposure to the sex act, but Sherlock had been desperate, unable to think of anything else. He’d murmured to her, explained to her what he wanted to do, promising he’d stop if she didn’t like it. But she was Molly, and she trusted him with her life and body, and she’d nodded. He’d laid her on her back, her nightgown pushed up around her hips still, holding her hands in his, soothing her as he schooled himself to be gentle with her. One taste of her on his tongue and he’d nearly passed out in bliss. And he’d given Molly her second orgasm that night with his mouth._

_Sherlock had laughed quietly when she’d almost instantly fallen asleep in his arms after her second orgasm, collapsing against the pillows as he’d licked his mouth, chin, and fingers clean. He’d held her, watching the sunrise. He’d kissed her, sneaking back out of her flat with her sleepy smile warming his heart, the scent of her clinging to his fingers._

_When the day arrived, he cursed the weather._

_He had to walk or find a driver that was insane enough to navigate through London in this weather._

_One way or another, he was going to his Molly. He would have his Molly._

_To his chagrin, he walked all the way to Molly and when he got to her front door, he wasn’t surprised that it was she that answered the door and not her housekeeper. “Did you walk!” she’d been horrified at the sight of him, wet to the bone._

_It hadn’t been what he’d imagined._

_He’d imagined walking to her flat, carrying something ridiculous like her favorite flower or a cake from her favorite bakery. Instead, she’d taken him by the hand and rushed him to her roaring fireplace after hastily stripping him of his wet clothes in her foyer, “God, you must be freezing,” she’d pushed him into the armchair, naked and shivering, watching with interest as she’d run to her bedroom to grab a luxurious white towel for him. She’d knelt in front of him, stoking the fire, using the towel to dry him, “oh Sherlock,” she’d frowned, seemingly uncaring for his nudity, too concerned about his health, “darling,” she murmured, rising on her knees to dry his hair._

_She’d made him a cup of tea with a generous splash of brandy to warm him. He’d sat sipping it quietly, letting her dry his hair with the towel, and it was then that she’d finally realized Sherlock was completely naked in her armchair._

_She’d dropped the towel._

_And he’d barely managed not to break the damned teacup._

_Who kissed who first, neither of them ever remembered. But he would never forget her trembling fingers that night as she’d touched his throat, his shoulders, his chest, groaning into his mouth when she’d touched his nipples and he’d gasped involuntary at her slightly damp touch. Her voice had been soft, hesitant, both of them gasping as she’d touched his erection nestled between their bodies, “is it—is it—do women do to—to men what you did to me? With—with their mouth?”_

_“Yes,” he kissed and licked her ear, gripping her wrist and forcing her to stop stroking him or he would orgasm before either of them were ready for it, “but not tonight Molly, I want tonight to last for you.”_

_She’d looked up into his eyes with wonder, in that special way that made him feel…alive…vital…like he actually mattered._

_He’d taken her to her bedroom, vaguely wondering where the housekeeper was until Molly had cheekily told her she’d given Mrs. Rogers the night off. He’d spread her beneath him on the bed, touching her, petting her, only half registering the fact that the tenderness he thought he lacked came to life when Molly was with him. He needn’t have worried about not being gentle with her, she was his Molly, after all. And there was a part of him that watched in fascination as he touched her so carefully, that watched her for any sign of discomfort or hesitation._

_“Darling,” he’d whispered against her throat, his two long fingers buried deep inside her dripping wet heat, trying to take away as much of the sting as he possibly could, “would you prefer to be on top?”_

_She’d shaken her head, “you,” she’d gasped, blinking and he’d seen fear in her eyes._

_He’d kissed her eyelids, her cheeks, “it’s alright,” he told her as he’d climbed between her open legs, “it’s going to be alright Molly, I won’t hurt you, I swear it on all that I am or ever will be,” he’d strained for control, terrified that he would hurt her, that no matter how much he’d prepared her with his mouth, with his fingers, he’d still hurt her with his cock, “just tell me when to stop, if you need me to stop.”_

_She’d nodded, bringing her hand between their bodies to touch his prick again, “I just—I just didn’t expect you to be so—so big,” she’d gasped artlessly, “what if—what if you don’t fit?”_

_“My Molly,” he’d laughed without meaning to, kissing her throat, her breasts, “I’ll fit,” he’d promised, brushing her hand aside to take himself in hand, “you were made for me,” pressing his forehead to hers, “tell me if it’s too much,” he insisted against her mouth, “only this first time you’ll have pain, after this, only pleasure. I promise. Christ, Molly,” and he’d finally slipped the very tip of himself inside her, his arms, his shoulders, his legs straining with the effort to keep himself from thrusting inside her, burying himself inside her completely in a single thrust._

_She felt delicious._

_She felt like home._

_She’d gasped in pain, nodding encouragingly, her trembling hands soothing his shoulders even as tears leaked out from beneath her closed eyes. She asked him to stop and he did, kissing her, wishing she had wider hips or_ something _that would have made it less painful for her, wished his prick wasn’t the size it was if only to ease this pain for her. When Molly nodded, he moved inside her again, and they both sighed in relief when he was buried completely inside her._

_Molly had encouraged him, thrusting up to meet his hips with hers, and when he’d touched her clitoris with the back of his fingers, she’d come undone beneath him and he hadn’t been able to keep himself from spilling his seed inside her, pressing his face into the pillow behind her and roared into the mattress by her ear. The little death, the French called it, and after years of sex and debauchery, Sherlock finally understood why it was named thus._

_“That was…” she’d brought him back to reality with her gasp, the rain and thunder pounding outside, the first of a million occasions when Sherlock would notice the cocoon of isolation, of peace he found with Molly, “that was amazing. Oh God,” she’d looked down at him, his cheek against her breastbone as he’d tried to find the strength in his body again, “is that—is this a normal experience?”_

_He’d chuckled softly, “there is never anything normal between us Molly,” he’d grinned, sneezing rather rudely and abruptly. He’d managed to lurch to her bathroom, bringing back a wet towel and wiping away the mess he’d between her thighs, blood and semen combined, calling forth the possessive animal that prowled whenever he was with Molly._

_He’d gotten a rather bad cold after that. But he never, for one second, regretted walking in the rain to Molly that night._

Sherlock emerged in Rouen now, laughing slightly. He’d never been so sick in his life, running a high fever, even losing his voice for a few days which had driven him mad with boredom and frustration. But he’d had Molly’s company to soothe him, and the world had recognized her power of him in those days. Mrs. Hudson, the Watsons, and his brother had come to know that Molly was the only force in the world that could go toe-to-toe with him.

            He looked down at his sleeping Molly, and wondered if this was what love felt like.


	8. Chapter 8

When Molly tackled him off the bed, he vaguely wondered if this was the new direction in their relationship, she’d thought he was alluding to the night before, the new excitement in their sex life. Dazed, he found himself thinking that it was typical of his Molly to take what he said further than he’d intended. He’d been imagining more inventive positions and exotic locations to engage in coitus, not full body tackling.

As she rolled him beneath her, reaching up to draw a pillow down and cover their heads, she covered his head with her body, pressing her breasts to his face. It was only when the second explosion shook the room that he realized she’d pushed him to the ground to protect him, the windows of the room having blown out from the artillery, and he was sure another bomb would take off the side of the hotel.

Cursing, finally awake and jarred from the bliss of Molly’s arms, he moved quickly, rolling them again so that he was covering his Molly. He squeezed his eyes shut, listening for the telltale sounds of incoming artillery, calculating whether now was a good time for them to move or not.

“Sherlock,” she gasped his name from beneath him, and he could tell just by looking at her that she was about to flip them, so that she was protecting him instead. Her small hands were against his back, her eyes burning with concern, animated by the emergency that had literally exploded around them, “are you alright?”

“Are  _you_?” he asked, using all his senses to verify that she was in piece, that she was alright.

Whatever soft thoughts that had been lingering in the minds of Molly Hooper and Sherlock Holmes vanished as they crawled towards their dress robes, pulling them on and scrambling out of the room before the next shell hit. They headed to the wine cellars of the hotel that had been turned into bomb shelters, Colonel Richardson immediately finding Molly, “you’re a doctor!” he exclaimed, as if she had forgotten.

Molly was swept away from Sherlock instantly, praying her eyes would adjust to the darkness of the cellar as she hurried to triage the wounded soldiers that were being brought in for shelter, the boom of the canons outside not at all insulated by the depths of the cellar. Sherlock watched Molly, wearing his blue dressing gown and somehow managed to look composed and regal, ramrod straight as chaos straight surrounded him. He seemed terribly unphased until Molly ran out of options, calling his name as she struggled to keep a soldier from bleeding out, needing an extra pair of hands.

He knelt down in front of her immediately, “what do you need?” he asked.

She barely glanced up at him and he found himself slightly disgruntled at her lack of attention to him. He realized he could be anyone in that moment, it didn’t matter to her as she fired off rapid orders at him, directing him to put his hands in a certain spot, even grabbing the sash of his dressing gown to bind the bandages to the wounds. Sherlock knew he was being childish but he felt petulant that she didn’t look up at him, didn’t say his name again, didn’t tell him that he was doing a great job. All her attention was focused on the soldier dying on the cold floor of the wine cellar. 

He watched the frenzied way she worked, but finally came to understand that there was, in fact, no frenzy involved. Molly was simply moving fast and efficiently, so familiar with the procedures, so sure of herself that she barely stopped to think, and she kept working, as if going down a checklist of things that she had to do to get the patient from one point to another. Her fingers were nimble, her hands capable and strong, and he became obsessed with the way she chewed on her bottom lip when she was focusing on her work.

The siege that night seemed to last a lifetime, and Sherlock tried to make himself as useful as possible to Molly, offering to do whatever she needed him to. When she’d realized he really meant it, her smile had been broad and tired, and she stopped long enough to put her hand on his chest for a brief second of contact before she had whirled away from him. That brief touch meant more to him than any other contact between them, and he felt silly when he put his hand over the spot she had touched, knowing the residual warmth he felt was in his imagination, caused by the potent hormones and chemicals in his brains that forced him to think he was in love with Molly Hooper.

Not three hours before he had been intimately connected with her, as connected as any man and woman could be, naked, skin to skin, sharing bodily fluids and their bodies. What was a simple palm against his chest, compared to all of that far more intimate contact? 

She’d been directed to the kitchen sink and given all kinds of soaps by the French staff to wash the blood from her hands. There were layers of blood and gore caked up to her elbows, though she had been sure to at least wash her hands between patients, if she’d found time. Molly had looked exhausted, barely able to move as she’d stared at the sink as if it was the most daunting mountain to climb. He’d pushed her towards it, using soap and hot water, he’d washed her arms for her, kissing her forehead as he’d done so, wondering if she was capable of falling asleep on her feet. She’d murmured a “thank you” against his lips, and he’d hoped she would find a quiet room to rest, but she had gone back down to the cellar to be with the patients. 

His skin still burned with inexplicable warmth as she told him to go to the makeshift mess that had been created upstairs. The artillery had stopped, the Hun, as the Germans were crudely called by front line soldiers, pushed back into submission, however temporary. “What about you?” he’d demanded, “you could use rest more than me.”

“I’ll be right there,” she had smiled, pushing him towards the stairs.

To his dismay, Richardson had been having tea in the mess when Sherlock had arrived, insisting that Sherlock sit with him. At least the colonel was as silent and brooding as Sherlock had wished him to be, leaving blissful silence, except for the ringing in his ears that had been brought by the artillery. When Richardson spoke, his annoyingly jovial tone was serious and grave with the volume decreased to a more manageable level, “I don’t know what we would have done without Dr. Hooper,” he’d admitted, “there’s no one else within miles without medical training. She’s quite a talented surgeon, for a woman.”

Sherlock rubbed his tired eyes, wishing Richardson had simply shut up, had omitted the last sentence, “well,” he managed to growl, “she’s a talented surgeon for a  _human_ being, and thank God for that.”

Molly kept her promise and walked in not long after that, looking exhausted and drained, dark circles under her eyes, pale and gaunt. “’Lo,” she managed to the higher-ranking officer before collapsing into the chair next to Sherlock. She was never one to care about decorum or outward appearances, but he knew she was beyond exhausted when she pressed her head to his shoulder, resting there as she closed her eyes, taking a deep breath.

“Eat something then go to sleep Molly,” he murmured to her, not wanting his voice to jar her from her sleepiness.

She shook her head, “I’ll just have some coffee and head back downstairs,” she told him.

“No,” he made his voice clear, “you’re going to eat something, then I'm taking you to some quiet corner where you can get some proper sleep,” when she opened her mouth to argue he spoke over her, “we’ll have someone standing by, if one of the wounded should need you, they’ll fetch you immediately. We both know an exhausted mind is of no value to anyone.”

He ordered her eggs benedict with a side of toast, butter and jam and had practically force feed her. She made him smile when she insisted that he eat too, and they shared the plate with Richardson watching them with a mixture of curiosity and a longing neither Sherlock nor Molly acknowledged. As soon as they were done, Sherlock, in rapid fire French, demanded one of the hotel workers direct them to a room that hadn’t been destroyed. 

When they got to the room, he lowered her to the bed, knowing she wouldn’t let him strip her so she could sleep more comfortably. Insisted, he sat with her feet in his lap as she lay back, already asleep before her head touched the pillow, snoring softly as exhaustion stole her away. He removed her shoes and stockings for her, rubbing her feet, laughing softly when she moaned with pleasure even in sleep.

Her strength astonished him, left him grasping at straws, at explanations for where her reservoir of strength came from, where her resilience sprouted. They lived in a world that treated women as weak, as second-class citizens who weren’t even trusted to vote and yet she had chosen a career that demanded everything of her. She had sacrificed her reputation, her standing in her class, her prospects of marriage. The latter was destroyed when she had first demanded to attend medical school, further tarnished when she had insisted she be treated as an equal at Bart’s and was made head of department, and was completely destroyed beyond recognition when she had become involved with him, when she held his hand in public places, when she favored him with her smiles, when she made no secret that she loved a man she was not married to.

He remembered young women from when he had been younger, who had gone to smithereens when the slightest rumor was attributed to them, when a falsehood had marked their pristine reputations. Having been raised with the landed gentry and social elites, from a bloodline that was traced directly to the Plantagenets, Sherlock was used to his class placing women in fragile categories and treating them as spun glass. He was also used to the women who allowed the treatment to persist, who had believed that women were lesser than men, capable only of becoming wives and mothers. 

Then he had met Molly...and she had changed his world, his universe. Molly, who met every rumor with a laugh, who met every black mark with a welcoming grin, who heard every rumor with humor dancing in brown eyes.

What made her so strong? 

Was there something in her biology? In the way she was raised, by loving parents in the countryside, with a scholar father? Had his early death given her the thick skin that moved her?

Looking down at her now, cuddled against his chest, so innocent and vulnerable in her exhausted sleep, he found himself obsessed with the answer. Needing to know, to unravel her secrets, to steal some of her strength for himself. 

She was startled out of sleep, her eyes flying open, terror evident as she looked around the room. She was still asleep, acting out whatever piece of reality that had invaded her dreams. When her eyes settled on him, her palm still resting over his heart, her smile was unbidden, “my Sherlock,” she murmured as she curled against his chest again, pressing her ear to his chest as if listening to his heartbeat, “my Sherlock,” she repeated contently, “I love you.”

Unfamiliarity gripped, terror hissed in his ear.

 _I love you, Molly_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the late update, I've been busy and...well, unmotivated.
> 
> I hope you enjoy this chapter! And send vibes my way so that I can update this faster!


	9. Chapter 9

            Molly didn’t understand what was happening, didn’t understand the senseless tears that streamed down her face. She huddled into the corner, pretending to look out of the window, peeking around the blackout curtains that were meant to be useful during an air raid. She didn’t want anyone to see that she was crying.

            Typical woman, incapable of hiding her emotions. She made a fool out of the medical profession.

            She had watched hundreds, perhaps thousands of men and women die or already dead, even before the war. Death was a part of her daily life, a reality that she stared at, a specter she didn’t quite understand but whose presence she knew and understood, as much a part of life as breathing or eating or drinking water.

            And her comfort with death, with mortality, had been something that had gained her notoriety throughout her career. She remembered her first autopsy. She’d been the only woman in Professor Brooks’ class, and the only person who had survived until the end. That had been when Professor Brooks had taken Molly under his wing, making her his apprentice of sorts, inviting her along to all sorts of events to introduce her to the London medical and surgical society. He would always tell people about how she’d handled her first autopsy.

            When she’d lost her first patient, only a year after graduating from medical school, she’d again gained the respect of her colleagues and mentors for the way she spoke with the family, the way she personally handled the death of the patient.

            And since the war had started…death had become an old adversary, sometimes the only comfort she could imagine for the mangled bodies that shrieked and screamed with human voices.

            So why was this young man’s death affecting her? Why was she crying for him? Why for _this_ young man and not all the other hundreds and thousands that had died before him?

She closed her eyes, taking a shaking breath and remembered the way she’d woken up that morning, huddled against Sherlock’s warmth, both of them having slept on the cot that was too small for Sherlock by himself, let alone Molly. She’d left Sherlock asleep in their makeshift bed, slipping away from him, pressing a kiss to his lips before she’d gone down to the cellar to check on her patients. The first thing she did after checking the more seriously wounded was arrange transportation to a real hospital where they would be given the treatment and proper care they needed. She knew the real hospitals were overwhelmed too but what could she do? There was no way she could keep them here, in a dank cold cellar without proper equipment to care for them, without proper help.

            That’s when she’d heard the ragged breathing of the young man, Robert. Bobby, he’d told her in his lucid moments. She’d done everything she could for him, but there was just so much damage to his body. His lung had collapsed, his kidneys were shutting down, and even though she’d plugged every hole in his intestines, the damage had been done to the rest of his organs. He’d wheezed and fought and in the end…well.

            Collapsing into a chair, she hadn’t realized she was dozing until she felt a familiar hand touch her shoulder, and a cup of coffee appear in front of her, “cream and a bit of sugar,” Sherlock murmured, sinking down to his knees in front of her, trying not to let her see as he winced from his shoulder tugging. He was freshly shaven, his jaw gleaming, smelling of his familiar cologne. Only he would be able to look so calm and put together in the middle of a war, wearing his uniform.

            He seemed to be shining.         

            Tears brimmed in her eyes again, her lips quivering with emotion before she could stop them, before she could stop _him_ from noticing. The flicker of light from the window and the darkness of the room made his one eye green, the other a crystal blue as he frowned at her in concern, instantly alert, “Molly,” he rose up on his knees, holding the mug of coffee in one broad palm, the other caressing her jaw as he pressed his forehead to hers, “Molly,” he repeated, “what do I say to you?”

            “You heard?” she murmured, gripping his wrist as if her life depended on it, her fingertip finding his pulse there and reveling in it.

            He nodded, shutting his eyes, his long, curling eyelashes fanning out across his cheek, “I don’t know how to help you,” he growled, “I don’t know how to make this alright. Death is a part of existence, it’s a part of life. All things move towards their end, all lives end, all hearts are broken, I know that. But to see you _mourning_ like this –” he shook his head as if the words weren’t coming, “what do I tell you? Cold logic seems to have no bearing right now on your pain.”

            Taking a deep, shuttering breath, she smiled slightly at the thought of Sherlock Holmes attempting to defy his own logic and comfort her about the most logical thing in the world, death during a war. A year ago she could never have imagined this attempt, but here he was, _trying_. “I don’t know either, she answered, “I don’t know how you can help me through this, what you can say, what you can promise,” she wrapped her arms around his neck, “all I know is when I’m in your arms, everything is…it’s bearable. As long as you’re with me Sherlock, I can take on the whole universe. It’s when you’re not with me that I panic.”

            He kissed her cheek, carefully balancing the steaming cup of coffee in one hand as he used the other arm to hug her against him, “you’re a brilliant surgeon, maybe you can suture us together, that way I’ll never leave your side.”           

            She laughed softly, enjoying the sensation of burying her face against his throat, smelling him, feeling his skin right behind his ear, “how’s your shoulder?” she asked him.

            “It’s alright,” he was making smooth broad motions with his hand against her back, his breath a warm puff against her shoulder as he spoke.

            Frowning, Molly pulled away, “please don’t lie,” she begged, “is it hurting? Take off your jacket and shirt, let me see.”

            “Molly,” he said in annoyance, “I’m perfectly alright.”

             Tears welled in her eyes again and she was powerless to stop them as they overflowed again, as she looked into his eyes and was suddenly swept away by the thought that if the bullet had hit him a few inches to the right…he would’ve been gone, he would’ve left her all alone in the world, deprived of his warmth. What a dark, horrible it would be without him, what a horrendous thought to be permanently deprived of the color changing eyes, those lips, to lose that brilliant mind, that voice. She would’ve turned into a walking corpse…

            “Molly?” he frowned at her now, those gorgeous eyes confused and concerned and she realized he’d probably said her name a few times.

            “Please,” she managed, “let me see Sherlock, I need—I need to make sure you’re alright, I need to make sure my world is safe, right where I left it.”

            He sat back on his heels, surprise radiating from him as he watched her for a few minutes, his eyes searching hers as if trying to understand her, as if she were some sort of puzzle he couldn’t quite piece together. “Alright,” he pressed his lips to hers, “alright darling.”

            When he reached for his buttons, she was impatient and pushed his hands away, her shaking fingers less useful than his but she had to do it, pushing the jacket off and unbuttoning his shirt. “Sorry,” she murmured as the tape from the gauze pulled the skin at his shoulder.

            He made a humming sound, holding perfectly still for her as she examined his healing wounds, murmuring to herself the way she usually did, her tears streaming down her cheeks unchecked. Sherlock watched her carefully, reading her every emotion as best as he could, memorizing every twitch of her face as she frowned in concentration, the way she bit her lips, her eyes flying to his whenever she thought she hurt him.    

            “You know,” he told her softly when she was finished examining his shoulder, carefully putting on a new bandage over it, “I’m frightened too.” The shock in her eyes made him laugh softly, the way her brown eyes flew to his, “I’m not a fool.”

            “I never said that,” she said, indignant.

            “Only a fool wouldn’t be frightened Molly,” he murmured, looking away now, unable to speak while she watched him with those brown, gorgeous eyes, so knowing, “when Mycroft told me you were here, in the war? I lost my mind. It was bad enough imagining you in London, without me, but imagining here, under artillery, under bombs, mustard gas attacks…I lost my mind with worry. Every night I have nightmares that something happens to you and I’m not there. Fear is not weakness Molly,” he reminded her, “why do you think it is?”

            She nuzzled his throat, seeking comfort, his warmth after she’d finished taping his shoulder, “because I always thought you saw fear as weakness, as something to be ashamed of. You’re always so calm, so stoic even when looking down the barrel of a gun—”

            “But you’ve seen me afterwards,” he reminded her, “you’ve _felt_ me afterwards, holding you like a madman, dying for you, desperate for you.”

            Sherlock sighed her name as she wrapped her arms around him again, holding him as she fought for some semblance of control of her fear, her emotions, all that she was feeling. The fear that paralyzed her was there in his eyes now, and he didn’t hide it from her, letting her see the truth of his words. “I hate this,” she told him, “I hate living in this fear, this insecurity. I want it to be over.”

            “I can ask Mycroft to have you transferred home—”

            But she cut him off, “not unless you’re coming with me.”

            “I have work left—”

            “Then I stay,” she cut him off again, “where you go I go my love, my soul.”

            His smile was brilliant as he kissed her again, drawing her breath into his lungs, moaning at the taste of her, uncaring who heard, who saw how much Sherlock Holmes loved his Molly.

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know what you think!


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